


Even in Dreams (Love Still Goes On)

by shikachu (ruethereal)



Category: SHINee
Genre: Alternate Universe - College/University, Fluff, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-03-14
Updated: 2012-03-14
Packaged: 2017-11-01 22:39:38
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,996
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/362055
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ruethereal/pseuds/shikachu
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Jinki, Minho learns, is a third year astronomy major, which he insists is, “much more than just looking at stars and stuff, though a lot of it is just looking at stars and stuff.” He laughs, but Minho finds it oddly suiting.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Even in Dreams (Love Still Goes On)

Seoul streets, Minho finds, are more comforting at two in the morning. Somehow lit in the strange mixture of washed out street lighting and blaring neon signs, the narrow alleyways feel more at home than they ever did in the daytime hustle and bustle. It’s quiet, most of the drinking crowd stumbling home, leaning heavily on friends’ shoulders in search of the nearest taxi. Minho’s part time job often has him working well into the AM, but they’re the only shifts he can get that don’t run into soccer practice. 

For the third time this week, it’s raining. The light summer drizzle turns wet roads into a distorted, Wonderland-esque reflection of the noraebang-restaurant-convenience store duplexes that make up most of his neighborhood. It’s only two blocks more until his house and as he figures, not far enough to warrant using the umbrella dangling at his side.

Just before turning onto his street, Minho notices a boy about his age taking refuge under the awning of the street stall he and his friends used to frequent in high school. He looks rather lost, but friendly enough, with light auburn hair just short of falling into his eyes and features that manage to keep their softness even under the harsh fluorescents. 

The boy catches Minho staring and before he can turn away, his face splits into a grin. It catches Minho by surprise, the way this stranger's smile seems to light up his face (and that he can see his _whole front row of teeth_ ) but even more so when he finds himself smiling back.

Minho makes it a whole five steps before doubling back and holding out his umbrella to the boy whose expression has gone back to slightly confused. 

“My house is up the street, just take it.” 

And he once again manages to coax a smile out of the stranger after he’s thrust the umbrella into the other boy’s hands (he makes sure not to let his fingers linger). 

On the second try, Minho makes it home. 

 

Sleep deprivation makes his early morning Korean literature class all the more painful to sit through and by the time chemistry lab rolls around, Minho’s headed towards the nearest coffee shop. He trudges up the stairs to the campus dining hall and in his zombie-like state, almost misses the familiar face passing by on the opposite side. Minho whips around just in time to catch the boy by the shoulder. 

“Hey.”

“Um, hi?” The still-unnamed stranger offers him the same puzzled smile. “Do I know you?” 

“I guess you don’t remember me, but I’m...I’m Minho,” he finishes lamely. 

“Oh, were you at freshman orientation? I’m usually good with faces but there were so many of those little - oh, I mean no offense - I’m Lee Jinki by the way, but I guess you already knew that?”

Not exactly knowing how to react, Minho only nods mutely. Jinki. Lee Jinki. Minho turns the name over in his head a few times before realizing Jinki’s still talking. 

“-terrible feeling for forgetting your name and all, so can I make it up to you with lunch?”

What Minho should say is that he has chemistry lab in five minutes, that make-up lab is at the same time as soccer practice tomorrow. Instead he replies, “Okay.”

Jinki, he learns, is a third year astronomy major, which he insists is, “much more than just looking at stars and stuff, though a lot of it is just looking at stars and stuff.” He laughs, but Minho finds it oddly suiting.

Jinki tells Minho about his hobbies (badminton, drinking coffee, and casual horticulture) and the stray cats that have moved into the bushes in front of his apartment (Virgo and Little D) between mouthfulls of tonkatsu and rice. It also turns out that Jinki lives two streets down from Minho, in one of the newer high rises he passes on his usual route to school.

They get to the subject of part time jobs and in an act of bravery, Minho suggests Jinki visiting him at the barbecue restaurant he waits tables in. “I can only get the night shifts, but I figure if you’re up that late…”

“I’d love to, but,” Jinki hesitates, “I’m usually out cold by twelve. Actually, I have trouble keeping my eyes open after eleven.”

Which all sounds very suspicious for a coffee-drinking astronomy major who Minho met at two in the morning just yesterday. Minho takes it as the other boy’s subtle attempt at rejection and he tries not to let the disappointment show on his face. 

“Oh, well that’s okay then.” 

 

Minho only sees Jinki in passing for the next couple days. They traded numbers after lunch but Minho has yet to think of a good reason to call. And it’s not as if he really has the time either, tonight is his third night shift since Monday. Thankfully though, the students out for a Thursday barbecue-soju binge are fewer in number than their weekend counterparts – his boss decides to close shop an hour early. Minho wipes the last table clean and bows goodbye to his coworkers as they shuffle out the door. 

When he steps outside he almost trips over the figure slouched over on the curb. The boy in question, all tousled hair and rumpled clothes, can’t be -

“Jinki-hyung?”

\- but it is. Lee Jinki, outside of Minho’s restaurant. Waiting for Minho. At least all signs seem to point to that. Well, except that Jinki is fast asleep. 

Minho tries nudging him awake. “Jinki-hyung, wake up, I don’t think I can carry you all the way home.” After poking and prodding and calling his name, Minho goes as far to shake the other boy by the shoulders only to have Jinki’s head loll around in his unconsciousness. (Minho would laugh if it didn’t look so dangerous.) He eventually stops trying in favor of joining Jinki on the curb, who almost immediately makes a pillow out of Minho’s shoulder. 

The taller boy maneuvers out of his jacket and drapes it over Jinki, wondering why he went out dressed so lightly and _are those baby blue Donald Duck pyjamas?_ Soon Jinki’s rhythmic breathing has Minho drifting off, never mind that he’s sitting on a street corner in the middle of the night with a boy he barely knows. Jinki fits warmly against his side and his hair is soft against Minho’s cheek.

He wakes up cold.

The small amount of light creeping up the sky tells him that it’s early dawn, maybe five or six in the morning. The next thing he registers is that he’s alone. Jinki’s sudden disappearance leaves Minho bewildered, so much that he can’t even bring himself to be upset. 

 

He doesn’t need to seek out Jinki at school, the other boy notices him in line at the coffee shop and waves good morning. Previously-not-so-upset Minho finds himself suddenly quite upset at the sight of guiltless Jinki’s face.

“You could have at least woke me up,” Minho spits out before he can stop himself.

“Huh?” Jinki’s look of genuine confusion derails any of Minho’s thoughts of another dramatic outburst. 

“You kind of fell asleep on me last night…literally.”

“Oh. _Oh._ Then I’m guessing,” Jinki starts rummaging through his backpack, “this is yours?” He offers Minho’s jacket to him sheepishly. 

Minho is almost reluctant in taking it back. “You looked cold.”

“I’m a sleepwalker,” Jinki explains once they’ve gotten their coffees and a table. “It started when I was little and the doctors have no cure for it. They said it’ll go away on its own, like someday I’ll just grow out of it. Sorry about last night, I didn’t do anything strange did I?”

Minho answers Jinki’s question with another question. “You don’t remember anything?” 

“Sometimes I get bits and pieces, they say a lot of sleepwalkers remember what they do as dreams. I’m usually pretty harmless. My mom used to try locking me in my room but I was more of a danger to myself there than wandering out on the streets, I’d walk into the furniture and wake up with bruised toes.” 

Minho laughs and Jinki seems relieved.

“I lived with a roommate for a while, but I’d rearrange his CDs and try on his clothes in my sleep. It used to drive him crazy.” 

 

It doesn’t surprise Minho anymore, to see Jinki wandering around their neighborhood after work. He starts to follow the other boy, content to let him lead them around before gently guiding Jinki back home. Sometimes Jinki stops, for no reason in particular, to look up at the sky. And in those tiny moments they spend stargazing together, Minho lets his hand slip into Jinki’s. The other boy’s smile widens, only a fraction, but it’s enough to make Minho’s heart soar. 

They find gaps in their schedules to have lunch together and Jinki tells Minho what he dreamed about the night before. 

“Last night, you saved me from a pack of lions,” Jinki leans in excitedly, voice barely above a whisper. 

Minho doesn’t have the heart to tell him that the only thing he saved Jinki from last night was the Chihuahua next door trying to chew off his shoelaces.

Although it costs him about an hour of sleep each time, Minho looks forward to spending nights with Jinki. The older boy never says anything, but the way his eyes crinkle in happiness, the way he always pauses at the door to turn and wave to Minho, are worth nodding off in class and the bags under his eyes. Jinki adds a certain spontaneity to Minho’s life, making him stray outside of the careful and compartmentalized routine he’s made for himself. 

Like the time Jinki had stopped him in the middle of the street, took his hands, and waltzed him around, going as far as attempting to twirl Minho on tiptoes before just as abruptly continuing on their nighttime stroll. Or the time Jinki sat on the swings in the park and looked back expectantly for Minho to start pushing. Jinki had actually laughed, with his mouth wide open and his hair whipping around his face and Minho too, felt like he was flying. 

It happens one night, when Minho finds Jinki in the garden of his apartment playing with Little D. When their eyes meet, Jinki doesn’t give Minho the usual look-these-are-all-of-my-teeth grin. This is something softer, something that pulls the corners of Jinki’s mouth upwards in fondness. The moonlight catches Jinki’s face just so, and before Minho realizes it, his hands are on Jinki’s face and his lips are pressed against Jinki’s lips. 

When Minho pulls away, the guilt immediately washes over him. Because he knows Jinki, sweet and earnest Jinki, is still asleep. 

Minho turns away before he can see the expression on Jinki’s face. 

“I shouldn’t have done that. I’m sorry,” he apologizes, though the other boy probably can’t hear him anyway. 

 

They’re in their usual corner of the campus coffee shop, on the high stools and Jinki is absently swinging his legs back and forth. 

“You know,” Jinki starts, breaking the silence that had settled between them. He fidgets with his drink sleeve. “I had the strangest dream last night. I dreamt…I dreamt that you kissed me. Isn’t that silly?”

Jinki laughs nervously. Minho could join him, could play it off like it was really just a dream. But with sweaty palms and his heart hammering in his chest, he decides to take a leap. 

“I did,” he breathes.

“Oh. Well,” Jinki looks everywhere but Minho’s face, “well you could have at least waited until I was awake.”

The second time Minho kisses Jinki, he doesn’t see stars, but it’s warm and feels more right than anything else in his life. What draws them together feels less like gravititation, and more like the force of falling in love. 

“Am I still dreaming?”

“Nope.”

“Then kiss me again.”

And Minho does just that.


End file.
